Apokalupsis
by ErykahMiszti
Summary: PostNot Fade Away. This is the legacy of Buffy’s plan and Angel’s apocalypse. This is mainly a Spike story and may contain Spuffy leanings but that's not the main thrust of the storyline and I'll be dealing kindly with other ships and characters.
1. Discovery

Title: Apokalupsis

Author: Erykah Miszti

Timeline: Post-Not Fade Away.

Summary: This is the legacy of Buffy's plan and Angel's apocalypse.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Prologue

_**a·poc·a·lypse: **from Greek__ apokalupsis__, revelation,_

**_1._** _The imminent destruction of the world and the salvation of the righteous._

**_2._** _Great or total devastation._

**_3._** _A prophetic disclosure; a revelation._

**_"From now on, every girl in the world who might be a Slayer, will be a Slayer. Every girl who could have the power, will have the power. Who can stand up, will stand up. Every one of you, and girls we've never known, and generations to come... they will have strength they never dreamed of, and more than that, they will have each other. Slayers. Every one of us." - Buffy, Chosen  
_**

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Pain. White and hot. Screaming. It might be his own but he can't tell. The world is falling apart around him. Earthquakes rip the ground. Lightening rips the heavens apart. Thunder rolls and booms, deafening and ominous.

"We must leave now." A cold voice tells him.

"No!" He cries desperately, struggling against the iron fists that drag him away. The others…

"They're gone." The flat voice states – did he say it out loud or are they now so close that they can read each others minds? - and the light and noise fades from the world, leaving only absolute, infinite silence.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

**Chapter One: Discovery**

It was the end of an age, although granted it didn't entirely look like it was. The sun was still beaming down on the urban sprawl and tall glass skyscrapers of central Los Angeles. The traffic was still inching along the freeways. The smog still lingered in the valley between the mountains. Planes still landed every few minutes at the airport.

When viewed from high above, LA still looked the same as it had before but these appearances were wrong because everything was very different.

Xander Harris grabbed a case from the baggage carousel and dumped it on the trolley held by Marina. The trolley skidded as she hadn't really been paying attention to holding it steady. Xander sent her a look – his one good eye flashing with irritation - but found that she still wasn't paying attention. She was scanning the baggage collection area warily with her sharp eyes. Her body was tensed and ready for action.

Marina was 23 years old; a tall, curvaceous brunette with irritatingly perfect skin and a fondness for black leather trousers. Marina was also a vampire slayer, which made everything else seem to make sense.

"Trouble?" Xander asked her, aware that her slayer senses were more highly attuned to danger than his merely human ones.

"This city reeks of trouble." She replied in clipped English tones. "Something very bad has happened here." Her eyes were haunted. Her gifts extended beyond the normal Slayer ones.

"In the airport?" Xander asked cautiously.

"Everywhere." She shuddered and Xander resisted the urge to do the same.

Marina had always freaked him out. This strange slayer was also a witch but, unlike his best friend Willow, she had no cute charm to soften the face she showed to the world. She was flat out weird and creepy and she seemed to like it that way. He'd tried to get Giles to pair him up with someone – anyone – else but the Watcher had been insistent. Marina's gift for seeing what had happened in places in the past would prove useful on their mission. Of course, Xander hadn't actually wanted to take the mission either. Going looking for Angel and his little Fang Gang hadn't been top of his priorities list anytime this century but Giles had been insistent on that too. Willow and Kennedy were needed in Australia. Faith and Wood were needed in Cleveland. Buffy and Dawn were handling Europe. Giles could have sent Andrew but he didn't trust him enough in this situation. This needed someone who could handle the dark hole in the world that was LA right now. He was only half convinced that he was the one for the job.

"Come on." Xander said to Marina, drawing the trolley away from her grasp. As he led the way out of the baggage hall and into the terminal, Xander pretended not to notice that he was the only man visible for as far as the eye could see. Instinctively he moved closer to Marina, his bodyguard.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It was shaping up to be another balmy night in Los Angeles but, now that darkness had fallen over its environs, the streets were suddenly empty. No cars moved on the freeway. No planes lit the sky with little flashing red dots. Lights blazed from every window but nobody walked the streets. The entire city was awake but it could have been a ghost town. No one slept. No one made too much noise. Mothers shushed their children's crying when it became more than a whisper in the night. Houses were boarded up from the inside; chained & padlocked. Makeshift weapons were piled within easy reach.

This had never been safest time of day for a human to be out in this city but to be on the streets now was just plain stupidity.

Xander Harris trudged down the deserted road, with Marina at his side, cursing the name of Rupert Giles. Things were bad in the other places he'd visited – in England, in Italy - but you at least still saw people living their lives after sunset. People were cautious but they weren't so terrified that they abandoned their towns and cities for the evening.

"And why are we wandering the streets again?" He asked the Vampire Slayer.

"You could have stayed in the hotel if you're scared." She told him distractedly.

"I'm not scared." He lied. The eerie silence of the city terrified him. "I'm just questioning the sense of wandering around out here. We should have gone to the Wolfram and Hart building tomorrow morning."

"That's not where we'll find the answer to all this." She stated mysteriously, her eyes constantly scanning the area for trouble.

"How can you be so sure?" He asked even though he wasn't really sure he wanted to know.

The sound of feminine heels tapping on concrete was like a dagger in the silence. Marina turned to him and put her finger to her lips to shush him. Xander sighed inwardly.

"Slayers!" He muttered under his breath and Marina shot him an evil look before returning her attention to tracing the source of the sound.

Some way up ahead of them a young brunette appeared out of a side street. She was pretty, incredibly slight and look terribly alone. She looked like perfect prey for the beasties of the night. On cue, almost inevitably, one appeared. A really ugly, brutishly muscular vampire in game face stepped out in front of her. Marina tensed for action, then scooted into the shadows. Xander followed her automatically.

"Hey babe." The vampire began. "What you doing out here in the middle of the night?"

"I'm looking for Vincent." The young woman replied in a trembling falsetto.

"Vincent, huh? What business would a little human girl have with Vincent?"

He moved closer to her and ran a hand down her face. Marina, followed by Xander, crept nearer blending with the shadows.

"That's between me and him." The young woman stated, she sounded scared but defiant and determind.

"Okay, I'll take you to him but let's just have a little taste first. I'm sure he wont mind." He grabbed her by the throat and lowered his fangs to her neck.

Marina pounced, a stake suddenly in her hand, knocking the vampire back off the girl. They struggled violently.

Xander grabbed the girl's hand and tried to pull her away to safety but she turned on him and the beautiful, delicate face stared back at him like a cold mask with dead eyes.

"I don't need your help." She stated, her voice incredibly icy. Xander physically stepped back in shock at the change in the woman. "Your Vampire Slayer will get us all killed."

"What!" Xander demanded but got no further as the night came alive, in a manner of speaking. Vampires appeared from everywhere. "Oh fuck.." He started and reached into his jacket for his knife and stake.

The young woman spun around and punched one of the vampires. He flew into the air and back 20 feet or so. Xander's eye went wide but he had no time to question as the fight was on him. To his left he could see Marina fighting off wave after wave, to his right the young woman was doing to same. He briefly wondered if she was a Slayer too but he didn't have much time to think about it. He attacked the vamps with everything he had in him.

From behind him he heard a roar of fire and half turned away from his immediate fight to see one of the vampires go up in flames. A black clad figure had joined the fray and he seemed to be on their side. He fought silhouetted in the light, his face obscured. Punching, kicking, spinning, dusting vamps left, right and centre, the man made short work of a good number of the creatures before they decided to cut their losses and ran off into the night. When he was sure they'd gone, the man stormed across to the young woman without turning to face Xander. She was kneeling on the asphalt.

"What the bloody hell did you think you were doing heading off without me..?" The man demanded in a very familiar voice with a marked British accent.

"Spike!" Xander exclaimed and the man span on his heels to face him.

"Oh hell!" Spike irritation was very obvious as he recognised Xander. "What are you doing here?"

"You're alive!" Xander replied stupidly. Spike smirked.

"Not technically." His mouth twisted bitterly.

Xander stared at Spike, struggling to take it all in. The jeans and T-shirt were the same, all black. The long leather coat was the same but look very much worse for wear, unbelievably scuffed in some places. The platinium blonde hair was gone, a buzz cut was in its place and the remaining short hair was dark. A thin scar was visible in sharp relief across his throat.It could have been a trick of the dim light but he looked distinctly older. He was certainly leaner and looked like he hadn't slept in weeks… and he was standing right there in front of him!

"She's dead." The young woman cut in bluntly.

Xander tore his attention from the resurrected Spike to the body the woman was kneeling beside. Marina lay there not moving, blood still oozing from the gash in her chest where her own stake had been turned on her.

"Oh no." He said wearily, he never got used to losing people.

"Who was she?" Spike asked, his voice a little softer now.

"A vampire slayer." Xander replied sadly. "Giles sent us here to find out what happened to Angel."

He looked back at Spike, unable to conceal his amazement at seeing him – and, if he was honest with himself, fighting down a bitterness that Spike was standing there while Anya was still dead – despite knowing that Marina deserved someone to mourn her at least just for this moment. Spike eyes flashed but then he pursed his lips and looked away.

"Angel is gone." The young woman replied in that awful flat tone of hers. "They're all gone, apart from Spike..." She inclined her head in a gesture that looked like a twitch. "..and me."

"What did you guys do!" Xander demanded harshly, pain and bitterness came out in his voice. All the horrors he'd seen in the past few months couldn't be contained and he decided to dump the blame on Spike and Angel just because there was nowhere else he could think of putting it. Besides, old habits died hard.

Spike turned away and stuck in his hands firmly in his coat pockets. For a long moment he said nothing but then he sighed deeply.

"Angel fucked up." He replied softly. "We fucked up." He amended. "We broke everything." His shoulders shook slightly as if he was trying not to cry but his voice trembled, betraying him. "And I don't know how to fix it."


	2. Half Truths

Title: Apokalupsis

Author: Erykah Miszti

Timeline: Post-Not Fade Away.

Summary: This is the legacy of Buffy's plan and Angel's apocalypse.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

**Chapter Two: Half Truths**

"What did you do?" Xander asked again, more softly this time.

Spike's soft words had shocked him. He'd never wanted to feel compassion for this vampire, for any vampire, but the hurt positively radiated off Spike.

Spike straightened his shoulders as if steeling himself and when he turned back there was no hint of the emotion of a mere moment before.

"This isn't the place for storytelling. Let's get you off the streets before those uglies come back for a re-match." He looked over at the girl and scowled hard. "Get rid of that 'costume' Blue." He bit out the words harshly.

"It was necessary." She replied flatly but it sounded sort of as if she meant it to be an apology.

Xander watched transfixed as the delicate figure transformed into much harder creature, still the same but obviously different. There was the blue hair for one thing, and harsh eyes and red shell-like cat suit for another.

"What are you?" He asked.

"I am Illyria." She replied simply.

"Let's go." Spike stated, cutting off any further questions. He strode off down the road, obviously just expecting the others to follow him.

Xander sighed and did just that.

"What did I do to deserve this?" He asked of no one in particular.

"Perhaps it's something you didn't do." Illyria suggested, not having understood that it was meant as a rhetorical question.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Xander took in the pokey apartment they'd brought him to with a resigned expression.

"Kind of reminds me of my ol' basement." He joked.

"Smells better." Spike commented sarcastically as he grabbed a bottle of Jack Daniels off the TV and flopped onto the threadbare sofa.

"Har dee har." Xander replied.

Illyria stood near the doorway and observed Xander as he wandered around curiously, saying nothing. Spike had told her about Xander during the long hours they spent together.

There wasn't much in here apart from the sofa and TV (with a Playstation hooked up to it), just a flimsy looking dining table with two chairs and an overflowing ashtray. Three doors led off the room and beyond them he could see a small kitchen, a scruffy looking bathroom and an empty looking bedroom with two single beds.,. well, that answered one question.

"Still living in the height of style then Spike?" He said without humour.

Spike took a long swig from the whiskey bottle, gave a twisted smile and bit back a retort, he was too tired to play this game with Xander.

"Come on then, Spike." Xander prompted. "What's the story?"

Spike stared at the blank TV screen.

"What's the story?" He echoed absently. "Good question." He looked up at Xander. "I suppose that you agreed with Giles that Angel had gone evil by joining Wolfram and Hart?"

"You've gotta admit, it did look that way." Xander acknowledged.

"Only if you're a clueless nonce, who assumes things without bothering to find out the truth." Spike replied bitterly.

"You sound like you're defending Angel." Xander commented incredulously. "You always hated him as much as I did!"

"There's exactly what I mean. You assume without understanding." Spike spat. "You can take the boy out of Sunnydale…" He trailed off.

"Okay, why don't you tell me how it was?" Xander replied bitterly. "Why don't you tell me how come you didn't get destroyed in Sunnydale and how you came to be Angel's greatest fan?"

Spike shook his head and drank some more whiskey. He looked up at Xander.

"Can't believe Andrew kept his word and didn't tell you guys I was back. I didn't think the kid had it in him."

Xander just looked back at him waiting for him to continue. He looked pissed.

"Alright," Spike sighed. "So some old enemy of Angel's brought me back to mess with this shanshu prophecy, you know, this 'becoming human after fighting an apocalypse' thing. Didn't intend to work with Angel, didn't start out that way at all, but along the road it just happened. We worked a lot of stuff out between us. Found we had stuff in common."

"What?" Xander mocked. "Both having attacked and hurt Buffy!"

Spike was on his feet in an instant, leaving the bottle on the chair.

"You take that back!" He yelled. "Or, so help me, I'll rip out your spine!"

"It's true though, isn't it? You did try to rape Buffy." Xander pointed out cruelly.

Spike swallowed hard and closed his eyes for a moment.

"Yes." He admitted finally and opened his eyes. "I had a moment of total madness, that I shouldn't need to justify to you because it's between me and Buffy. It's that thing again! You assume you know everything. That's what always gets me about you Harris." Spike got right up into his face. "You don't know shit, especially about love. Where's Anya now, Harris? Do you even care?"

Xander went very pale.

"Anya died in Sunnydale." He said in a very strained voice.

Spike's expression grew even blacker.

"I know." He backed off from Xander and retrieved his bottle. He raised it slightly before drinking from it, almost as if he was doing a silent toast. "I know."

"She died a hero." Xander stated proudly.

"Means less than you think." Spike muttered into the bottle neck. "A live hero's much better."

"I won't have you putting her down!" Xander bellowed, misunderstanding him.

"Me!" Spike responded in amazement, jumping back to his feet again so they were toe to toe. "You're a lost cause! What colour is the sky in your world!"

"Just tell me how you and Angel destroyed the world!" Xander's face was twisted in anger, not a pretty sight.

"By trying to save it!" Spike yelled back. "We just wanted to make this world a better place. Take out some of the nasties that make it so bad for you pathetic little humans to live your lives. You people, who never accepted us, who never believed we could change, who we were once the same as but could never be again. We wanted to make the world a better place for you."

Xander held his look steadily.

"You wanted to appease your own guilt, you mean?" He said nastily.

"Some of that." Spike admitted. "And what's so wrong with that? What's wrong with doing the right thing for the wrong reasons? You've been doing it all these years!"

"What?" That had confused him. Spike smirked.

"You've been fighting evil all these years because it's the right thing to do…? Or because it keeps you close to your precious Buffy?"

"I'm not going to dignify that with an answer!" Xander countered.

"Why not..? It's what you've accused me of doing. Why is it alright for you to just want to be with her but why was it never right for me?"

"Because you were evil!" Xander pointed out as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "For all I know you still are!"

"Look around you Harris." Spike suggested calmly. "If I was evil, you think I'd be living in this dump with just an emotionally stunted ex-God for company?" He gestured towards Illyria who was still standing in the doorway, calmly watching this unexpectedly interesting scene between the two men.

Xander followed his gesture and his eye widened as he took in the fact about Illyria being an ex-God but he shook it off and returned to the fight.

"Okay, maybe you're not still evil." Xander admitted, Spike made a mocking 'thank you' gesture and went back to his chair. He slumped heavily into it. "But… how did we get into all this?"

"I forgot who I was talking to for a moment." Spike sighed.

Xander shook his head in disbelief.

"Spike..." He began again patiently. "What happened?"

Spike shrugged and continued his tale.

"Angel decided to take down Wolfram and Hart… to kick them out of this dimension. It wouldn't have kept them out forever, just stopped their plans for the short term." Spike looked over at Xander. "We could have used your help, all those Slayers of yours would have made the fight very different."

"We couldn't trust you." Xander said weakly, looking at the floor.

"You could have sent someone to find out…" Spike pointed out softly.

"Andrew said…" Xander started attempting to justify it.

"Andrew is an idiot." Spike said with a slight smile. "He's a sweet kid," That admission sounded dragged out of him. "But he's an idiot."

Xander nodded in agreement.

"We didn't do badly on our own." Spike continued, his voice contained a mixture of pride and regret. "We lost Wesley early on... then ended up in a rain soaked alleyway… two vampires with souls, a former god and the bravest human I think I've ever met, bleeding his heart out on the road." Spike looked at his hands. "A huge demon army coming at us… they were Wolfram and Hart's revenge for our double crossing them." He snorted bitterly and opened his mouth to say something but seemed to change his mind and closed it again. He took a drink instead.

"We fought like dervishes," Spike smiled. "Gunn especially. He knew he was dying so he had nothing to lose. He must have taken out dozens of them before he fell, and even then... blaze of glory, literal." Spike grinned broadly. "He set fire to one and it just spread through them!" The grin faded. "I lost sight of the others for a long time. Everything just became about killing and blood... for hours or days, I'm not sure." He swallowed hard and shook it off, he looked back at Xander. "I woke up in an alleyway with Illyria looking after me. We haven't seen Angel since and the world is all wrong now. It's Wolfram and Hart still taking revenge for what we did. They opened the doors to another dimension and the evil is just pouring in."

"Oh god!" Xander exclaimed, his face a picture of horror. He sank down onto one of the dining table chairs. "We should've been here to help."

"Yep." Spike replied. "You should've, but what's done is done." Spike compressed his lips and suppressed his bitter thoughts. "Go to bed now, Xander. I'll sleep out here. I'll take you to a phone in the morning."

"I have a cell." Xander said absently, still thinking.

"Then go call the Watcher now." Spike corrected.

"We need to close that portal." Xander nodded, still looking a little stunned.

"Yeah." Spike replied flatly.

Xander went into the bedroom and closed the door behind him. Spike sighed incredibly deeply and rubbed tiredly at the short hair on the crown of his head.

Illyria went to the TV, started the PlayStation and picked up the controller.

"You lied to him." She stated, probably not meaning it to sound like an accusation but Spike took it that way anyway.

"I did not lie." He defended and took another swig of his Jack Daniels.

"You didn't tell him everything." She was staring at the game's opening screen.

"He's here on behalf of The Watchers. They don't own me. I don't owe them an explanation." He covered.

"They might be able to help." She loaded her previous game. "The Slayer and her minions might be useful."

Spike thought about that. Xander was going to tell Buffy that he was here. What would she say? Would she come here? The thought filled him with terror. He knew he was no longer what she remembered but he hadn't seen her in such a long time. How could he explain to her about Angel? How could he explain to anyone about Angel? There was no way he could let things stay the way they were.

He sighed deeply and glanced over at Illyria, there were no more questions forthcoming and she was now absorbed in the Simpson's game but she'd made him start thinking and remembering the things he hadn't told Xander.

Spike thought back to that night with confused emotions. He'd been covered in blood, bruised, fighting for his very existence, having the time of his life inflicting bloody murder on the demon hordes… and hordes they were, they just kept coming. Spike quickly lost count of how many he'd slaughtered, they became faceless masses of flesh that he had to kill or be killed by.

Thinking back now, he wasn't as proud of that fact as he had been at the time. The down side of having a soul, he even regretted killing the bad guys. There was always that little nagging doubt inside him… he'd changed even though people had written him off as an evil fiend. How many of the "bad guys" he'd slaughtered might have the capacity to do that too. He himself was proof that even though you can't save them all, that might not be a reason to give it a bit of a go at least. That bloody soul giving him feedback again. He'd had too many years to think about this stuff.

Spike snorted out loud and Illyria looked up from her game for a second. They'd already had the redemption discussion and he knew she didn't agree with him, so he didn't bother mentioning it again. She turned back to the game.

There had been none of these thoughts back then, on that night of pain and violence. The last time he'd seen Angel he'd been clinging to the tail of the dragon, getting whipped about through the air. Illyria had been easier to spot for a while, throwing demons about as she had.

As he'd told Xander, Gunn had gone down pretty early but he hadn't expected him to last long anyway. At least it had been that blaze of glory… not like what happened to rest of them.

Spike remembered a blade heading for his head… then he was standing in the field. He hadn't faded out or in or anything like that, there was no shaft of light. He'd just been there, standing under a frighteningly perfect starry sky with a field of grass extending for miles all around him and the only other thing visible was Anya, smiling at him perkily in the brilliant moonlight.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

"Where am I?" Spike demanded. "I was fighting…"

"Nice to see you too, Spike." Anya replied pointedly, still smiling.

Spike stared at her.

"But you're dead!" He said in total confusion.

"Yes, I died in Sunnydale." Her perky smile never faded.

"Where are we?" He asked again.

"I'll tell you when the others get here." She told him.

There was a squelching sound and Angel appeared to his left. Another squelch and Illyria turned up on his right.

"Where are we?" Angel demanded from him.

"That's what I'm still trying to find out." Spike replied and looked pointedly at Anya.

"Hello." Anya said, inclining her head towards Angel and then Illyria. "I'm Anya."

"She's dead." Spike told Angel.

"What!" Angel said.

"Anya, an explanation would be good right now but, somehow, I'm guessing we didn't survive the fight." Spike suggested.

"Nope. You lost. Badly." She said smartly. "But the good news is that you went out champions."

"But did we destroy Wolfram and Hart's operation on Earth?" Angel asked anxiously.

"You hurt them very badly." Anya told them. "They're mighty pissed at you." She smiled even more broadly. "But that shouldn't matter to you anymore!"

"Why?" Spike asked sarcastically. "You're not saying we made it to heaven?" He snorted derisively.

"Close enough." Anya said happily. "Congratulations boys. Welcome to your life."

"Huh?" Angel queried.

"Just listen." She put her finger to her lips to shush them.

Spike did just that; closed his mouth and listened. There were no birds, no sounds and he started to frown, wondering what the bloody hell she was on about but then he heard it. Somewhere near by there was a subtle rhythmic throbbing sound. He realised slowly that it was coming from him. He put his hand to his chest and, for the first time in over one hundred years, he felt his heart pounding.

"Angel!" He exclaimed looking up at the other man.

Angel had obviously just realised the same thing that Spike had because he broke out into a huge grin. Spike whooped happily and the two men grabbed onto each other… hugging, shrieking, grinning and dancing around happily…

"Why am I here?" Illyria asked Anya in her mono tone, ignoring the boys and their happy dance.

"You're a champion too." Anya replied with her perky smile.

"I'm not part of this prophecy." Illyria said. "Why am I here?"

The smile wavered but didn't disappear.

"The Powers That Be didn't tell me everything. They just said to expect you. Maybe they decided to give you a free pass too, another shot at life?"

"Then where is Wesley? Why didn't he get one?" The icy cold stare fixed on her. "And Gunn?"

"You're not easy to please, are you missy?" Anya frowned.

"Something is wrong here." Illyria said but Anya turned away from her dismissively and went back to the men.

"Come on, no time to waste. Let's get you settled in to your new lives." She said.

"Is this Earth?" Spike asked, still grinning like an idiot.

"Not quite." Anya replied apologetically. "That's the one thing that wasn't in the prophecy, I'm afraid. You get to live until you die, but you can only do it here." The smile went away. "You can't ever go back there."

"Typical bloody prophecy!" Spike snorted, he turned to Angel. "Well, least we don't have to fight about who gets to go after Buffy..."

The former vampires, now human, set off with the dead Anya across the field, chatting happily, as giddy as schoolboys eager to explore their reward. The sun started to come up over the horizon and they basked in its beauty and majesty.

Illyria followed some way behind. She didn't like this at all. She was right not to.


	3. Outright Lies

Title: Apokalupsis

Author: Erykah Miszti

Timeline: Post-Not Fade Away.

Summary: This is the legacy of Buffy's plan and Angel's apocalypse.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

**Chapter Three: Outright Lies**

"Are you gonna tell Buffy or do you want me to do it?" Xander asked Giles on the phone. He was sat on the bed nearest the window, looking out into the empty night.

"I don't think either of us should tell her." Giles replied after a long pause.

"But Giles…" Xander tried.

"Xander, Buffy is going to be in enough of a state about losing Angel, you remember how she was after Sunnydale? She won't be thinking clearly. She'll want to drop everything and rush over there but there are bigger issues to be considered here. We have to play the long game."

"You're right." Xander agreed.

He remembered only too well how Buffy had been when they were on the road after Sunnydale. He hadn't expected her depth of feeling to be that great. She'd only been back on her feet for the past few months, since being in Rome.

"I'll send Willow out there." Giles stated. "I'll brief her in advance, of course."

"She'll want to tell Buffy about Spike." Xander warned him.

"Yes." Giles sighed. "I'll just have to convince her that this is in everyone's best interests."

"Good luck!" Xander retorted.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Spike could hear Xander talking but couldn't make out what he was saying.

He was sick of sitting there watching Illyria keep smashing her cars up in the game. Guilt struck at him. They'd left the body of that Slayer out there in the alleyway. None of them had thought about her. He hadn't even remembered her until now.

"Bloody hell!" He muttered to himself as he dragged himself out of the chair.

He just couldn't leave her there. There were things out in this LA night that would eat her whole. That just wasn't right.

Spike grabbed his duster and headed out.

Illyria turned to watch him go but said nothing. Spike often went out alone in the night. He would come home covered in blood from whatever evil demon he'd taken his frustration out on. She could understand that so she let him get on with it without questioning him. He'd been through hell and now neither of them knew exactly what to do to fix things. He'd given up so much already, it was her turn to do something.

She would have to try and find Vincent again. The old vampire would know where the crypt was.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"I'm sorry I'm not there in person to tell you this Buffy. Xander just reported in…" Giles began, his eyes fixed on the tiny image of his Slayer on the computer screen.

"Angel's gone, isn't he?" Buffy interrupted him.

"Yes." He said softly.

Her head slumped forward and her shoulders visibly sagged.

"I knew it." She said so quietly that he barely heard her. "How did it happen?"

"They double crossed Wolfram and Hart, so they sent an army of demons to kill them."

"Oh god!" Buffy gasped. "We should have been there to help them!"

"Hindsight is always 20-20, Buffy. We didn't know and we couldn't run the risk of allowing Wolfram and Hart access to the Slayers." Giles rationalised.

"I know the argument, Giles." She stated firmly. "I even agree with it but we should have made sure there was no hope at all. Angel would have done that for me." She pulled herself together. "Did anyone survive?"

"Yes." Giles paused to draw a breath. "There was just one survivor from Angel's people. She's a former god, apparently, and her name is Illyria."

"A former god!" Buffy frowned. "How do you wind up as former God?"

"Well, there is a story about an ancient God called Illyria. She was apparently 'sleeping' in a hidden location called the Deeper Well, along with many old Gods. It's part prison and part safe haven."

"How did she get out and are we sure she's one of the good guys?" Buffy questioned.

"We don't know she got out but Xander's pretty sure that she's not evil." Giles covered. His knowledge of Illyria's goodness was based solely on her being with Spike, but he wasn't going to tell Buffy that. "But it does seem as if whatever Angel did upset Wolfram and Hart. They are the definitely the cause of our current problems."

"They're responsible for our global demon activity spike?" Buffy asked. Giles tried not to react to her innocent and yet highly appropriate choice of words.

"Yes, it seems that they opened a portal or a doorway to another dimension in order to let through the demon army. That doorway is still open and allowing evil to enter our dimension, almost like a planet-wide Hellmouth."

"Wow!" Buffy stated. "We REALLY should have helped them!"

"We didn't know this was going to happen." Giles reiterated. "I'm going to send Willow to LA. I've already been in touch with her and she believes that it is definitely the loci for the magical energy of the dimensional portal."

"Maybe I should go to LA to meet this Illyria?" Buffy suggested.

"I wouldn't recommend it, Buffy. You're needed exactly where you are, keeping an eye on the Immortal. We know he has links to Wolfram and Hart, maybe you can find out something useful from him."

"Yeah right." Buffy snorted. "I've met some tight-lipped men in my time but this guy takes the cake."

"Keep at it, Buffy. He's a powerful magician, maybe he knows how to close the portal." Giles offered.

"Keep me informed." Buffy instructed, then smiled fondly at him. "And Giles, when all this over, you come to Italy and I buy you coffee."

"Or you could come to England and I'll buy you a nice cup of tea and some scones, much more civilised." Giles smiled backs.

"Deal." Buffy agreed and Giles cut the video link.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Buffy stared at the screen long after Giles' face disappeared. The tears started slowly; a single tear at first and then a whole ocean. She sobbed loud, long and hard… she'd now lost both of the men that she'd loved the most in this world. The world suddenly seemed incredibly lonely.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Having taken the body of the Slayer – he didn't even know her name – to a graveyard and buried it, Spike stalked his way down the dark and deserted alleyways that made up his entire world.

Now that humans didn't come out at night anymore, he hardly ever saw any. It was at least good to know that so many of them valued their life enough to stay indoors…

A scream pierced the night.

…But there was always one didn't.

He ran towards the sound. He wasn't that surprised to find a man being attacked by a great big FFanhgash demon. Its slime was oozing all over the sidewalk and Spike, arriving at a run, went skidding across it, up into the air and straight into the side of a dumpster.

"Give me a break!" He complained as he got to his feet and headed, more gingerly, back to the fray.

The demon was big and ugly but really rather stupid and it took Spike no time at all to dispatch the thing.

He stalked over to the man, whilst trying to brush the yellow slime off his coat.

"Don't kill me." The man begged, scrunching further back against a wall.

"I'm not going to kill you, you idiot. I just rescued you, didn't I?" Spike drawled sarcastically. "What are you doing out here on your own? Don't you know that it's dangerous for a man to be out here alone at night?"

"I just wanted to get out of the house." The man said with a sigh. "I'm the only man left alive in a house with ten women. They're driving me mad!"

"I bet." Spike said in masculine solidarity. "You must NEVER be able to get into the bathroom!"

"Martin!" A female voice shrieked and Spike turned to find a foot hurtling towards his face.

"Oi!" He exclaimed as he picked himself up off the floor.

The woman started laying into him.

"Lynette, it's okay. He rescued me…" The man was trying to tell her but she wasn't listening.

"I'll teach you for trying to drink my husband, you evil vampire!" She told him as they danced. She didn't seem to have noticed that Spike was pulling his punches.

"You haven't got this quipping thing down yet, have you, love?" Spike replied, looking for an out. "So many Slayers around now and there's not a single one I've met that's any good at it. It's depressing. I miss the old days."

He obviously couldn't kill her – didn't even want to hurt her cause she'd need her strength to get them both home safely - but he wasn't going to let her dust him either, so Spike did the only thing he could.

He ran away as fast as he could.

"What a world we created, huh Angel?" He yelled out as he ran.


End file.
